All schools in Queensland’s southeast corner have been ordered to close due to bad weather caused by former tropical cyclone Debbie.
The government said the wild weather meant schools would be closed for the day, with the worst of the high winds and very heavy rain expected on Thursday.
From Friday the system is forecast to move offshore, but Police Commissioner Ian Stewart has warned of very dangerous conditions until then.
Deputy Premier Jackie Trad said the closures were about protecting people’s lives.
“The state Disaster Management Committee has made the decision to close all schools in southeast Queensland between Agnes Waters and the to the New South Wales border and out west to Nanango,” she said.
“We’ve made this decision based on updated forecasts from the Bureau of Meteorology.”
She said any students who’d already been dropped at school would be cared for, but she urged parents to pick them up as soon as possible.
Ms Trad said people should not underestimate the dangers the weather posed.
She also warned of the potential for public transport closures later in the day.
She said peak hour this afternoon would be a “nightmare” and appealed to employers to stagger finishing times to spare the road network from chaos.
“We do know that rainfall currently being experienced in some parts of southeast Queensland is in excess of the 250mm that was predicted yesterday. So we know that flash flooding is a real live issue throughout the southeast Queensland corner,” she said.
Police Commissioner Ian Stewart said the schools closure was “an unprecedented late call”.
“This weather event, which is significant, is causing us to make calls very, very early.”
The Bureau of Meteorology said flash flooding was likely, but it was a difficult thing to model.
“What we know is that we are anticipating the heavy falls in a short duration of time,” senior meteorologist Matt Bass said.
“We’ve already seen some of those this morning, particularly in the Gold Coast hinterland and really short intensity rainfall is the concern. And that will lead to the flash flooding so it is just a risk with those heavy falls across the southeast of Queensland today.”
There’s no concerns about the capacity of local dams to cope with the deluge at this stage, the police commissioner said.
The premier is on her way back from the northern cyclone strike zone to Brisbane for emergency meetings about the weather crisis.